Will wonders never cease?

NBC – a central pillar of the MSM criticizing the MSM for popular ignorance? Of course they blame others too, and yes, people who believe that Obama is a Muslim or that the Health Care Reform has been repealed are at best intellectually lazy or illiterate. But it is nice to see a admission like this one. Even better a resolve to do something about it, like restoring investigative reporting budgets so you aren’t so dependent on stakeholder press releases. Of course, people have to want reporters to buck those interests, and apparently many really would rather just not hear about it.

Here’s the passage:

*** The misinformed: You can only shake your head at these numbers: A Kaiser Family Foundation poll “found extensive public confusion about the health care law, with 22% of Americans incorrectly believing it has been repealed and another 26% unsure or unwilling to say.” Folks, the law HAS NOT been repealed. As we said when yet another poll showed a sizable portion of the American public thinking that — incorrectly — President Obama is a Muslim, everyone deserves blame here. The politicians. The citizenry. And especially the news media. We aren’t doing our jobs when the populace is this misinformed. As a collective, look at how the court decisions striking down the health law get covered vs. the decisions to uphold it. And then look at the conservative media outlets and their coverage of this issue.

7 comments

Of course, people have to want reporters to buck those interests, and apparently many really would rather just not hear about it.

A couple of years ago, at the White House Correspondents Dinner, Stephen Colbert offered this “praise” to the Bush-era mainstream media:

“Over the last five years you people were so good — over tax cuts, WMD intelligence, the effect of global warming. We Americans didn’t want to know, and you had the courtesy not to try to find out. Those were good times…as far as we knew.”

In fairness to the only slightly informed, the Republicans did capture the House in a massive fed by a backlash against Obama — and promptly voted to repeal the health care bill, which for the main hasn’t taken effect anyway.

Tut-tut to their lack of civics education and all that, but honestly I’m surprised only 22 percent think it’s been repealed.

Well, civics education and selective reading or hearing of the story which usually discussed the Senate or veto options.

But it is also indicative of how weak the bill was in terms of impact on individual lives. If the pre-existing condition protections and donut hole coverage hadn’t kicked in it probably would have been 32 percent.